David Ambrose - Storyteller Director of the Internazional Festival of storytelling Beyond the Border

Simply tell a story: without special effects, with only the
human voice. This is storytelling, and in an era dominated by
media, simplicity conquers all, especially young people, the ones
more curious about things. The most ancient art of men comes back
to theaters, cafés and in the festivals around the world, becoming
almost a genre while a return to its origins (it is believed that
even the drawings in the caverns were sort of "post-its" for
storytellers, notes to remember and pass on the stories of buffalos
and warriors).

At the National
Storytelling Festival created in Jonesborough,
Tennessee 40 years ago thousands of people listen for hours and
days: the biggest European festival is held in Scotland and every
year 2000 people and storytellers from Cuba, Norway, Columbia, go
to the "Beyond the Border". They have spread with the name
"festival della cuenta" in South America, and only in Mexico City
there are five; but maybe Canada has the oldest tradition,
according to the University of Oslo; while in Anglo-Saxon countries
it takes place in public libraries (to the point that some of the
most famous storytellers were librarians). Italy until recently
didn't have one. Despite a centuries-old tradition of jesters,
storytellers and a new rich season of narrators (under the label of
narrator we find Ascanio Celestini and Davide Enia, there's
Paolini, Baliani and Dario Fo, of course), there wasn't anything.
So the theater group Raccontami
una storia has opened one, small but independent,
hosted inside the Appia Antica Park in Rome, simultaneously
with the Tennessee festival.

At the Raccontami una storia (Tell me a story)
for three days curators, young people and legitametly enthusiasts,
Paola Balbi and Davide Barbihave tried to bring stars from Mexico,
England, Canada. Giovanna Cavasola, an Italian that now lives in
Mexico, that was originally a puppeteer. Heidi Dahlsveen that
teaches in Norway and tells magic stories, Mariella Bertelli comes
from Canada like Charly Chiarelli, but they are second generation
Italians, Pam Faro has told the story of a Titanic survivor. There
are short stories that last a minute and others that are long
hours, there are humorous stories and prophecies, Cuban fables and
Celtic adventures. Also there is a lot of improvisation. There are
a few rules: look the public in the eye, lights only, zero scenes,
no false tones, who knows how to sing can sing or play an
instrument.

"I am the son of an Italian immigrant, we came to Canada in '49, I
was just a few months old", Charly Chiarelli tells in one of the
most moving shows of the Roman festival. "My father didn't know how
to write and never learned English, my parents talked in Racalmuto
dialect and a none-existing English. They had never seen a stereo
or a can opener. They came from another planet. I tell the story of
this disorientation and their hard times and play the accordion in
my show". Storytellers today don't stop at corners in squares,
instead of "zirudelle" (facts that storytellers told, they were
atrocious stories or rhymes, they sold them at the end of their
shows, one hundred years ago) they sell dvds. But maybe they sell
the only magic we are still willing to believe in: that what is
simple is true.